What we talk about when we talk about leadership in South Sudan

ABSTRACT

It is important to think critically about how we develop leaders, particularly in highly unpredictable countries like South Sudan. This article gives an account of a yearlong reflective and experiential programme in Juba which sought to straddle the paradox of outside and inside: it took seriously the critical insight that leadership development needs to take greater account of endogenous experience. However, to do so we drew on methods developed elsewhere, but which prioritise local experience. The programme focused on the everyday interdependencies of group life, rather than an abstract and often idealised understanding of leadership favoured in many business schools.

KEYWORDS:

• Aid – Capacity development
• Methods
• Social sector – Education
• Sub-Saharan Africa

Acknowledgements

This programme was made possible by a grant from Open Society Initiative for Eastern Africa (OSIEA) and with the support and co-facilitation of Windle Trust International and the Windle Trust staff in the office in Juba.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

Notes on contributors

David Masua is Country Director of Windle International South Sudan, based in Juba.

Chris Mowles is Professor of Complexity and Management, and Director of the Doctor of Management (DMan) programme, at the University of Hertfordshire, U.K.

Nicholas Sarra is Visiting Professor at the University of Hertfordshire, supervisor on the DMan programme and at Exeter University. He is a consultant psychotherapist in the NHS.

ORCID

Chris Mowles http://orcid.org/0000-0001-8751-8942

Notes

1 By pragmatic we allude to American pragmatic philosophy from the classic period of Charles Sanders Peirce, William James, GH Mead and John Dewey, rather than using the word in its everyday sense.

2 Harvard Business School has drawn up an equivalent code for graduates of its MBA programmes, although there no research exploring whether this has made any difference.